What grieves the Lord and what pleases Him

When we were young, we either grieved our parents with our behavior or pleased them. Many of us who were raised in the middle of the last century can testify that our parents had persuasive ways of showing us when we were grieving them.

The apostle Paul’s letter to the Ephesians talks quite a bit about grieving and pleasing the Lord. In Chapter 4, Paul writes, “Do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption.” In that one verse, we are admonished not to behave in a way that grieves the Spirit, but we are also told that salvation is not lost because we are still sealed for the day of redemption.

In that chapter, Paul lists a number of things that grieve the Lord. He doesn’t mention obvious things like robbing banks or beating your children, but instead lists what many would consider smaller sins. Things like fibbing, getting angry, cussing, dirty jokes and sexual immorality in its various forms. But there is another way to grieve the Lord.

Ask any married or engaged person if they are grieved when their significant other is huffing and scurrying about getting chores done but paying no attention to them personally. You’ll get a resounding yes.

No event captures this scenario better than the story of Jesus coming to Martha, Mary and Lazarus’ house for dinner. Martha was distracted with all the dinner preparations, but Mary chose to sit at Jesus’ feet and listen to Him teach. Think about that. Martha was in the same room with God in a human body, and all she could think about was what was on her to-do list.

Martha’s mistake was that she let her work of serving the Lord become more important than being with the Lord. Jesus wasn’t grieved at Martha’s work ethic. He was grieved that she put working for Him above spending time with Him.

Do you and I do that? Are we so busy doing holy chores for the Lord that we neglect spending time alone with Him in His Word and in prayer? The old saying is true: “The tyranny of the urgent distracts from what is most important.”

Thankfully, Scripture tells us what pleases the Lord. Things like being filled with the knowledge of His will, living a life worthy of the Lord, bearing fruit in all that we do, growing in our knowledge of Him, not copying the customs of the unbelieving world, giving thanks to His name, and not forgetting to do good and share with others.

These aren’t things we do to earn salvation. These are things we do because we are saved. The writer of Hebrews in the New Testament says, “Without faith it is impossible to please God.” That verse is talking about saving faith, when a person trusts in Christ alone to forgive sins. So, we are already pleasing to God from an eternal perspective by the decision to trust Christ as Lord, but in our earthly walk we can please Him by how we live.

Now that we know what grieves the Lord and what pleases Him, we can pray Hebrews 13:21 for our own lives: “Lord, make me complete in every good work to do your will, and work in me what is well pleasing in your sight.”

Ken Staley is pastor of Faith Church of Pleasant Grove, with services at 9:30 a.m., and Harrisville Methodist Church, with services at 11 a.m. Both are Global Methodist congregations. He can be reached at PastorKenStaley@gmail.com.